


Hostile Architecture

by witchsoup



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, F/M, Miscarriage, Soul Bond, That old chestnut, a tiny sprinkling of dramione, soul marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-21
Updated: 2017-12-21
Packaged: 2019-02-18 01:39:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13089729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/witchsoup/pseuds/witchsoup
Summary: "Lucius will be Minister, and Bella will be mine, and you will sit prettily in your ivory tower, and give us heirs, and never think of the filthy Muggle name on your wrist. Do we have a deal, Lady Malfoy?"





	Hostile Architecture

It begins as a smudge, tucked inside the roll of fat on her tiny wrist. Born in the small hours of an April morning, by Yule she's a cherub dressed in frothy white lace, with a cap of golden curls and tiny pearls of teeth.

Her mother, Druella, gives the child a perfunctory bounce on her hip as she sips from a tall crystal champagne flute.

"Yes, Bellatrix is doing so well with her accidental magic these days. We would have loved to bring her along, of course-" she cuts off, downing the last droplets in her glass and holding it at waist height for a passing elf to refill. "-but the nursery maid came down with spattergroit, of all things, and the girls are under strict quarantine until Healer Crabbe can confirm they are both unaffected. He assures me little Cissy is perfectly healthy. Apparently, at her age we would have seen the-" she lowers her voice, leaning closer to the woman by her side. "- _pustules_ almost immediately."

Moments later a hush falls over the room as all of the glasses float free of the hands holding them. The tinkling sound of a spoon striking glass can be heard emanating from each one. All eyes turn to the huge dining room doors, where a man with pale blond hair stows his wand once more in his sleeve.

"May I present to you my son, Lucius Armand Malfoy."

Tucked behind his mother's skirts, the child peeks shyly at the crowd, before stowing his left thumb safely in his mouth.

Whispers ripple through the guests.

"Did you see it?"

"Could you read it? It looked very faint to me-"

"For it to be so prominent, it's unseemly, I would have the boy in gloves-"

The woman beside Druella leans in to murmur, "It's not a Black, at any rate. You cannot help yourselves but give your children a mouthful of a name."

Glancing up from her daughter, now sleeping in her arms, Druella smiles slowly. Turning her back to the crowd, she stretches out Narcissa's tiny wrist, until the two black marks are revealed.

"We have almost seventeen years until they're clear enough to read." She turns her gaze to the small boy, now laughing as his father conjures glittering birds from the tip of his wand. "I trust an advantageous match will be found long before that day arrives."

* * *

The Hogwarts Express is stiflingly hot, even for the girls in bell bottoms. Maybe even especially for the girls in bell bottoms. Narcissa wouldn't know.

In the heat, she knows, it's not unreasonable to remove the outermost layer, to undo the topmost button, to cross her legs and allow a flash of ankle and her prim little white socks open to the air. In the heat, she knows, there’s a flush in her cheeks.

She always knows when Lucius Malfoy is staring.

"Black," he calls down the corridor, and she peeks her head back out of the compartment door as if only just noticing him. "We're less than half an hour from Hogsmeade. I'd hate to deduct points if you're not in uniform."

Lucius crosses his arms over his chest, leaning against the door, and she makes a show of noticing his Head Boy badge.

"Surely you wouldn't take points from Slytherin before the year has even started, Malfoy."

She toys with the chain of her necklace where it disappears below her collar, a brilliant diamond nestled lower, skimming the tops of her breasts. It appeared on her pillow on Lucius' seventeenth birthday, with no indication as to the sender's identity.

"I suppose if you could give me a good enough reason, I might be inclined to bend the rules, just a little."

"Just a touch? For me?" she asks, smiling.

His brilliant grey eyes turn serious, as he reaches out to trace the lines of the carriage bench closest to her right hand, where her mark is concealed with a crisp white sleeve.

"There are... certain instances where the rules may be discarded if they are found to be... unsatisfactory. It's up to us, I suppose, to shape them how they ought to be." He slides his hand over hers, his family ring cool where it rests on the back of her palm. "To secure our future."

He stows his hand safely back in the pocket of his robes, and nods towards the window. Sunlight glints off his hair, so similar in colour to her own.

"I'll see you at the feast. Do try to look presentable."

When he is gone, she turns to Andromeda whose nose is resolutely buried in a NEWT Transfiguration textbook, and sighs.

"He sounds just like Bella."

* * *

"This is an incredibly prestigious occasion. We couldn't be more thrilled to have our whole family gathered in this ancestral home to celebrate Narcissa's seventeenth birthday." Druella smiles beatifically, refusing to falter even when her gaze lands on Sirius and the yellowed bruising on his neck.

Narcissa, from her position by the fireplace, has to watch him smirk every time her mother insists the family gathering is complete. Druella has replaced her second daughter with a son.

"My darling girl brought the dawn with her, I've always said." Her mother glances at the enchanted clock on the wall as it ticks ever closer to the moment Narcissa was born, seventeen years ago. "If you would raise your glasses: to Cissy."

Druella clasps her daughter's hand, smiling, but her grip is like a vice as she covers one hand with both of hers, glancing at the letters emblazoned in stark black on her wrist.

_Tom Riddle._

In the hours of drinking to follow, when her mother's hair comes undone and her father is pink in the cheeks, she hears them whispering to Abraxas across the dining table.

"He went to school with us, Cygnus, he was Head Boy, don't you remember? Abraxas, you were particularly close-"

"I wouldn't call us close, Druella, he was Head Boy and I was a Prefect. I often wondered if he could tell Avery and me apart-"

"But he disappeared after a while, didn't he? I haven’t given him a second thought since I was fifteen."

"He was a half-blood," her father whispers. "With a name like that, with talent like that, he must have been. Better than a Mudblood, I suppose, but not what you want for your most precious daughter-"

"The Muggles went to war, I'm told. I believe it's safe to assume he went back to where he came from, and was killed for his trouble," says Abraxas with an air of finality. "Now if you will excuse me, I haven't seen my son in a while. I must ensure he isn't rifling through your daughter's possessions as we speak, looking for a trophy."

"I want a winter wedding, Malfoy." Her mother snaps her fingers clumsily, and an elf appears to refill her goblet. "I shall call upon your wonderful wife for a trip to Gringott's. One of the Hapsburg diamonds would suit Cissy beautifully, I believe."

* * *

Lucius has his hands braced on the porcelain rim of the sink when she enters, reaching a hand out towards him, and laying it on his shoulder.

He starts at her touch, smiling wearily as he pulls her to his chest.

"It was all too much for me to handle, as well," she begins. Narcissa pulls back to look at him, smooth a hand over his hair. "They don't expect us back downstairs tonight- in fact, they'd be delighted if we stayed up here-"

"Did you see him?"

He runs a hand down her back, skimming his fingertips along the column of satin buttons on her spine, before gripping her more tightly to him.

"Sirius wasn't that bad, Lucius, he was no drunker than my mother."

"I don't mean your loathsome little Gryffindor cousin, Narcissa," he sighs, resting his forehead against hers. "My father tells me the Dark Lord thinks you look especially beautiful in your bridal gown."

Dread pulls at her stomach, but her voice is calm when she says, "Your father said he was waiting until you had taken over the business. Bella told me you were no use to him without Ministry connections-"

Lucius smiles, shaking his head.

"The Dark Lord believes I have potential. He wants me to recruit: men our age, respectable, wealthy. From what father tells me, the Malfoys will be bankrolling the revolution-"

She leans closer, scraping her nails against his scalp to whisper against his lips.

"So he means to honour you."

"If I can be useful-"

"But what about your little Gryffindor? When war comes, I don't doubt she'll be on the losing side."

Tugging at her hand, Lucius stretches out her wrist and presses a kiss to the name written there.

"Marlene McKinnon means no more to me than this filthy Muggle does to you, Narcissa." Pressing two fingers to her chin, he tips her chin up for a kiss, tightening his grip on her waist. "I believe I am extremely fortunate not to be Tom Riddle, no matter how fervently the stars insist you are to be his. You are mine."

He threads his fingers through those on her left hand, pressing a kiss to the diamond that rests there.

"I will be the Dark Lord's right hand, and I will give you everything that no other man ever could."

* * *

Knowing that this is how it is done, that this is how business is conducted, does not settle her stomach. Bella glitters, surrounded by men in dark robes, dressed in diaphanous black silk, hair piled high on her head. Where Narcissa's neckline is demure, Bella's plunges, held to the curve of her breasts with a stubborn sticking charm. The gown is sleeveless, and as she laughs the Dark Mark on her wrist writhes, snake jaws snapping.

"Your sister's lack of subtlety is quite refreshing, I find."

Narcissa starts, her champagne slopping over the side of her glass and onto her hand. Just as quickly, the droplets begin to crawl backwards on her skin, replaced as if nothing had happened.

All the while, the Dark Lord has his eyes trained on Rodolphus Lestrange, and his delighted smile.

"He is enchanted by your sister. Wealthy enough to suit our cause, weak enough to do her bidding without question- which is, of course, by extension, my bidding." 

Lord Voldemort smiles, raising a glass across the length of the ballroom to Lucius who watches on, face tight. A nervous smile flits across his face in return before he drains his goblet and moves, presumably, to find his father.

"What an obedient dog he is, your young husband. Do you find it suits you? Lucius is so desperate to prostrate himself before someone, something. I blame Abraxas, of course. I wonder how he's coping, the three of us being in the same room."

"My lord?" Narcissa asks, raising a brow.

"His maker, his master, and the goddess to whom this house is a shrine. I wonder, Lady Malfoy, would you care to dance? I fear your husband may be overcome by the sight of it, but that is a risk we will have to take."

"I would be honoured, my Lord, but custom-"

"Your husband will not deny me, Narcissa. You of all people know that."

She looks around for somewhere to set her glass, but it vanishes from her hand as Lord Voldemort takes it in his own, and leaves it dangling in mid-air.

The orchestra by the huge windows plays a waltz, and Narcissa's dress skims across the polished wood as they step together to the music.

"I would say, my lord, that Bella is not easily cowed. Nor has she any respect for weak men."

"I don't need her to respect him." His face is carefully blank, blue eyes glittering in the candlelight. "I need her to control him, and as we both know she is more than capable."

"But what about love? Surely, as your most honoured soldier-"

"Soldier? Are we at war, Mrs Malfoy?"

Narcissa juts out her chin, just a touch, and amusement flickers across his face.

"I read the newspapers, I have friends in very high places-"

"Can one be said to be powerful on one's back, Narcissa? When the underbelly is exposed?"

Colour rises in her cheeks, and she feels the flush spread across her chest, where the skin is near translucent and the veins track across her breasts in rivulets of blue.

"I would suggest, my lord, that men are the ones exposed. Especially men in love."

"Of course you love him. He worships you. But how much of that is vanity?" Voldemort turns her hand over in his, exposing her soulmark. "How much of your love is skin deep?"

Narcissa snatches her hand back, and he laughs.

"Your mother trained you well, but not well enough, it seems. You mustn't strike me in public, child, imagine what it would do to our reputation."

The image which flashed so briefly through her mind, of the Dark Lord's handsome face with an angry red handprint across one cheek, fades to nothing as quickly as it came.

"Bella doesn't have one. A mark. Believe me, I would know."

Narcissa refrains from wrinkling her nose. Beautiful as he may be, the Dark Lord is older than her father.

"Lucius is my most honoured soldier, Narcissa," he murmurs in her ear. "Think of Bella as more of a... decorated officer. But she will never have power like Lucius does, because of what nestles between her legs. Lucius will be Minister, and Bella will be mine, and you will sit prettily in your ivory tower, and give us heirs, and never think of the filthy Muggle name on your wrist. Do we have a deal, Lady Malfoy?"

Without waiting for an answer he drops her hands, leaving her to pick up her skirts and seek out the safety of the room’s periphery.

That night, while she brushes out her lazy curls, Lucius presses a kiss to the side of her neck, gripping the rope of her hair in one hand and winding it around his palm. When he slips a hand between her legs she stills, pressing him down on the bed and silencing him with a kiss.

As she pulls off her thin nightgown she sees a flash in her mind of a twin god and goddess: one wrathful, one generous.

* * *

"But what does the newest Malfoy think?"

Lucius' head snaps up from where their fingers are intertwined, quickly leaning forward with both hands on the table.

"My lord, Narcissa knows nothing of the accounts-"

"I believe that Narcissa may speak for herself, Lucius."

From the corner of her eye, she sees the snake on his forearm retreat into the safety of an eye socket. She presses a hand to the swell of her stomach, and clears her throat.

"Sales are steady in Britain and France, where our name is known. Of course, our first priority must be close to home, but looking towards... expansion, territories which felt the sting of Grindelwald's botched attempts most acutely are to be avoided." 

Her gaze, steadily fixed on the Dark Lord, says more about her true meaning than these carefully chosen words. Though they can speak freely within Malfoy Manor, it would not do to seem too knowledgeable.

"From Finland east, we would experience resistance, and the Americans, while they have laws in place which would surely make them sympathetic to our aims, are not ready to be colonised again so swiftly. That leaves us with Western and Central Europe. Rodolphus has contacts in Germany and Belgium. I suggest Lucius start there."

He turns, then, placing one hand over hers and gripping tight.

"My lord, my wife is not fit to travel."

"Who said anything about the girl coming with you, Lucius?" asks Abraxas. "You cannot bring your wife to the negotiating table, no matter how proficient she may be in our... accounts."

The Dark Lord pushes back from his chair and pours himself a drink from the cabinet.

"Lucius, you will have your elves pack your luggage, enough for a fortnight's stay. Take your idiot brother-in-law with you, and start in Dresden. There's enough activity there that your movements won't be remarked upon. You will, of course, have to use your initiative, such as it is," Voldemort continues, pausing to sip his drink. "No inciting unrest, no getting drunk and spilling our secrets to European whores, no overt recruitment of any kind. We don't need Albus Dumbledore sniffing around again."

Lucius stands, inclining his head, before pressing a kiss to the top of his wife's head.

"My lord. Father."

"A moment of your time, Mrs Malfoy?" The Dark Lord stands by the windows overlooking the Manor gates, and the village in the distance. "Abraxas, you may leave us. Tell your elves we want the plates cleared."

The door clicks shut behind Abraxas, and Narcissa feels a tug on her wrist, bidding her join her husband's master by the window.

"Your husband's master, but not yours." At the look on her face, he smiles, holding out his hand. "Give me your wand."

Narcissa realises in that moment that she has never seen him with a wand in his hand, never witnessed the raw power his Death Eaters are so afraid of. The things he does with wandless magic, while impressive, are mere cantrips.

"You have nothing to fear from anyone but me, Narcissa. I've questioned Bella about it - even she cannot hear your thoughts, try as she might."

"What do you want with my wand? It can't possibly work for you any better than your own, and if I have offended, my lord-"

"Don't call me that, Narcissa. Not when we are alone, not when we are such good friends." He crooks his fingers, and her wand appears in his hand. Before dinner she placed it in a chest on her bedside table, protected as she is by the blood wards which permeate every square inch of her husband's ancestral home.

"Priori Incantatem," he whispers, more for her benefit than to give the spell any potency.

A wisp of golden light emerges from the tip of her wand, coalescing into the shape of a foetus, not yet fully formed.

"You know as well as I do this child will not survive into infancy."

"She's strong, and so am I. I won't let the Healers intervene, not now, not after so long-"

His hand on her face silences her, but the moment tears track down her cheeks he turns away.

"So the Healers know the child is a girl. Did they also tell you there is a hole in her heart? You are a Black, Narcissa. How many siblings of yours did your mother have to bury?"

She rounds on him, knocking the glass out of his hand.

"I am a Black. I know there are ways to mend a broken body, to bring a soul back from the brink of death- I will do whatever it takes for my daughter."

"What about Lucius? Have you told him that his firstborn will more than likely die in the womb?

Narcissa's voice is low when she responds.

"What Lucius does not know cannot cause him pain."

The Dark Lord takes her face in his hands, frowning deeply.

"You are so different, the sisters Black. Bella rages against her misfortunes, but you suffer so beautifully. You push it down, I see it in your face. Hear it in your thoughts. Do you ever let it out, Narcissa Black? Do you ever embrace the madness that stalks your sister in the night?"

He leans closer, pulling her hands up to place them on his chest, and brushing his lips against her cheek.

"Of course not," the Dark Lord whispers in her ear. "For under such strain, diamonds are made."

When she wakes in her own bed in the middle of the night, the hot slickness between her legs has her gasping with the recollection of the night's events: it is only when her probing hand comes away red that she screams for Bella.

* * *

"Next we call Mrs Narcissa Malfoy, nee Black, to the stand."

This morning, she had dressed carefully in front of the mirror in the main bedroom, the one Abraxas so happily gave up for his master, and then for his son when it was clear he could no longer manage the stairs. Shying away from the blacks and greens which fill her wardrobe, she had opted for tailored brown robes, and dragonhide shoes with the smallest heels she owned.

She is the symbol of humility needed to bolster Lucius' defence.

"Mrs Malfoy you are aware that soul bonded partners cannot testify on behalf of one another in front of the Wizengamot," reminds Bagnold.

"My husband and I are not soul bonded, Minister, as I am sure your Azkaban records will show."

The Minister's mouth twists, maybe at the way her voice rings out through the cold, dark chamber in the bowels of the Ministry. Or maybe it is her refusal to look at Lucius, unkempt and thin, in heavy chains. Maybe it is her dry eyes that offend her.

"Please present your soul mark to the senior undersecretary for verification, such that our stenographer may make an official record."

Narcissa's eyes land on Cornelius Fudge, a man who she has heard Lucius call a half-wit on almost every occasion they had to do business. Beckoning her forward, his pudgy hands are cool on her skin.

"The name on Mrs Malfoy's wrist is Tom Riddle, Minister."

"It says here that your husband's soul partner is Marlene McKinnon. One of the members of the Order of the Phoenix his organisation stands accused of murdering. How does that make you feel, Mrs Malfoy?"

"If I may interrupt," calls a familiar voice from the crowd of purple hats in the chamber. "I remind you, Minister, that Mrs Malfoy has not been sworn in for testimony yet."

"Albus!" says Bagnold, flipping through her notes. "My file tells me that Tom Riddle was a Hogwarts student during your tenure as Transfiguration professor. Do you care to shed some light as to his character?"

Narcissa scans the crowd for her old headmaster, catching sight of his white beard close to the exit. His gaze is fixed on her, peering over the top of his gold-rimmed glasses.

"Mr Riddle was an exceptionally talented student, and capable Head Boy. Where he is now, I could not say. I have not heard the name Tom Riddle in a very long time."

* * *

The sun has gone down and the evening edition of the prophet comes an hour early. It appears on the hearth of Lucius' office while she's rifling through his drawers, searching for a key to unlock the trunk secreted in the back of their vast oak wardrobe.

It holds old memories: a silver mask and a hooded black robe.

At least it did. Lucius thought she hadn't noticed him flinch at the dinner table, eyes flicking to the source of the pain. His mark has been restless, a deep inky black darker than she's seen it in almost fifteen years.

She's flipping through the pages of the newspaper frantically, searching for the name of the dead student, when her husband appears at the door.

"It's not Draco."

The silence which ensues is deafening, and then it's broken by the whisper of his robes against the plush carpet. His mask is almost as familiar to her as his face.

Pulling it off with a wave of his wand, he continues, "But it wasn't Potter either."

"So he's truly back, then. Your master," she spits.

"My master will be arriving shortly. I would ask that you are dressed to receive him."

"Why?" She throws the Prophet into the fire, unwilling to read more about the murder of children. "You would let your comrade abuse our son, you would invite the Dark Lord into our home, again, why not let him see what else you have to offer, Lucius?"

Hanging his head, Lucius sighs. He makes as if to walk towards her, but stops dead in his tracks as a disembodied voice rings throughout the house.

"You would deny me shelter, Narcissa? Your mother taught you better than that, I hope."

She draws her wand, transfiguring her nightgown into forest green robes.

"My mother is dead," she mutters as she stalks out of the study, Apparating mid-stride to the entrance hall. "Not that you would know, having been dead yourself. My lord."

* * *

Voldemort knows his true visage unsettles her, but that his mask of humanity unnerves her even more.

"Your son is a coward bound to a Mudblood, Narcissa."

Draco studies his hands in his lap, dinner pushed around his plate without a morsel eaten.

"Harry Potter is on the run, aided by the youngest Weasley son and the Mudblood. Tell me, Draco, how do you rate their chances of survival?"

He swallows, his already pale face shining with a sickly pallor in the candlelight.

"Weasley is of little to no use to anyone my lord, but Granger - the Mudblood," he stammers, running a hand over his Mark, which cannot quite cover the words etched into his skin, "Is capable. She will keep them alive, even if it's through her knowledge of the Muggle world-"

"Lucius, your son suggests we begin our search among the filth of the Muggles."

"My lord, I do not mean to dictate your strategy, merely to provide what little information I can-"

"You have slept in the same castle as Potter for seven years, Draco. Eaten with him in the Great Hall, learned spells and enchantments by his side. If you cannot provide more information than that, I seriously doubt your intellect. And to think, your mother has always been a linchpin in our strategies. Perhaps the mother would be better suited to take the mark than the son- the whole set, how does that sound?"

"No, my lord," Draco bites out. From her position at the top of the table, she cannot see his hands, but the tension in his shoulders tells her he is gripping his wand.

Like her mother before her, she has taught her child to shield his thoughts. Where she has only grown more proficient as her sufferings continue, Draco's defences are shattered anew by every fresh round of torture.

"Dolohov will lead an expedition into the Muggle world, and send a splinter group to watch the Black house." The Dark Lord's face ripples, and the next moment his eyes are crimson, his skin bone white when he fixes Draco with an unblinking stare. "Draco will stay with me, where I might offer my tutelage when the opportunity arises. Do you concur, Narcissa?"

"We would all be truly blessed to learn your secrets, my lord," she replies, mouth curving into a smile.

* * *

"Yes, I dare," she hears Potter call, standing tall despite the grime and blood which covers his body, the jut of his chin and his grip on the wand in his hand the only indicators that he might come out alive, or at least go down fighting. "I know lots of things you don't know, Tom Riddle."

The ringing in her ears intensifies, and she is only dimly aware of Lucius tugging at her wrist, of Draco grabbing her by the shoulders. Though she still stands straight, she cannot feel her feet against the ground, covered in rubble and slick with mud.

"Narcissa," she hears, faintly.

"Mother," Draco murmurs, a look of terror on his face. "Mother, we have to go."

"No."

Draco looks to his father, already ten feet away, walking unnoticed towards a huge hole blasted through to the entrance hall.

"We have to watch him die, Draco."

He tugs on her shoulders again.

"If Potter dies we are fucked, mother, please," he begs, voice strained, afraid to raise it far above a whisper.

"Not Potter. I want to watch Tom Riddle die."

A scream of frustration rends the air, and a ripple moves through the crowd, silent and watchful as Potter and the Dark Lord circle one another.

In a flash of golden light, she shrinks back from the blaze, hearing screams from the onlookers. The next thing she is aware of is Draco is hoisting her to her feet, daubing at a cut on her forehead with a scrap of his cloak.

"Mother, can you hear me? He's gone, mother, he's dead." His voice cracks, and she reaches a hand out to cup his face, marvelling at the strip of blank skin where the Dark Lord's true name once was.

Draco drops to a crouch, holding his head in his hands. His body is wracked with sobs, and all she can do is survey the crowd, watching as the Granger girl is embraced by a lanky redhead.

A cheer goes up as a dark-skinned man levitates Voldemort's body, before dropping it unceremoniously on top of a jagged pile of rubble by the ruins of the professor's table. Turning from the sight of his body, she extends a hand to Draco and pulls a wand from her pocket.

With a deep breath, she looks to the rising sun, and rolls up her sleeves.

**Author's Note:**

> When is a Tomcissa not a Tomcissa? Oh, when you sympathise with Lucius. If that sounds familiar, it's bc I just very crudely bastardized a line from Caitlyn Siehl's poem Start Here. Sorry.


End file.
